Furniture=debacle

The new place has dark wood floors and medium wood cabinets. We have a medium wood bed and medium wood dressers. My desk in a large medium wood table. The dining table is...wood. With so much wood, which in this quantity isn't exactly my thing, I convinced Husband that we ought to paint all our wood bookcases (six or so, of varying sizes) white. It will lighten things up, I said. It will make the tiny house seem larger.

I said these things about two months ago, when moving felt more like a destination and less like a journey.

Last week, Husband, though a bit delayed, caught my redecoration fever. He carried the shelves outside before I even knew what was happening. So, we spent a significant amount of time choosing the right white at Home Depot. We listened to the paint expert, who encouraged us to buy the new 2-in-1 paint-n-primer. We sanded. Dusted. Applied two coats.

Six hours of work later and left overnight to dry, the paint was peeling off.

Believe it or not, Husband and I have not only successfully painted furniture before, but we're pretty good at refinishing, too. I like to get messy and kinetic. I want to be handy or crafty, but I struggle, except when it comes to painting and staining. I like the feeling of the paint meeting the surface, of motion that is at once liquid and scratch, and the transformation of object to process to project.

Luckily, this time we had decided to use a bit of left-over paint and primer from the last venture, a lime-green cabinet we use for bowls and things in the kitchen, on one of the shelves. Those are now completed and lovely. The paint adheres. The surface is durable.

Not so much with the others, with their miracle 2-in-1 paint and patchy curls of paint. There was moderate discouragement. Some blame passed around. It was early. It felt late. Crankiness. We already had sore wrists. And ten assembled still-empty boxes.

Eventually, Husband returned the paint and came home with a quart of primer and a gallon of paint, along with some more Zip-Strip, so we can strip off the peeling paint and start fresh. It is beyond tempting to keep painting. To paint over the peeling strokes and forget it. To ignore the need to start over, to try again.

I don't think you know until you are standing in the garage among the tins and bristles what you'll do next or how.